KISSIMMEE, Fla. – Throughout his long and often spectacularly successful managerial career, more than half of which has been spent in the perpetual storm of controversy known as New York, Joe Torre has specialized in putting out fires. It precisely was for that reason that Torre wanted his new Dodgers coaching staff to include Larry Bowa, who always has specialized in lighting them.

After Thursday’s Grapefruit League game, in which the Dodgers fell 7-6 to the Houston Astros in front of 4,189 at Osceola County Stadium, Bowa got in touch with his inner pyromaniac.

Bowa, having just watched the Dodgers commit four errors that could have been five; having just watched second baseman/outfielder Delwyn Young commit two errors that could have been three and having just watched all those errors lead to two unearned runs in a one-run loss, didn’t hold back when a small group of reporters came seeking his opinion.

On the game in general:

“We made errors, and you can’t make errors,” Bowa said. “You can’t give the other team 32 outs. You can’t do it.”

On Young, who presumably is a lock to make the club because he is out of minor-league options and can play at least four positions but is hitting .121 for the spring with 13 strikeouts in 33 at-bats:

“Young isn’t an everyday player, but he has to get better than what he is doing, I know that,” Bowa said. “He isn’t swinging the bat and he isn’t making plays. You have to do one or the other.”

Bowa’s take-no-prisoners personality partly might be responsible for the fact neither of his two big-league managerial stints, which took place 13 years apart, was especially successful. But it plays extremely well in his role as third-base coach for a Dodgers team that was crying out for a clubhouse enforcer, someone who is unofficially but universally recognized as Torre’s top lieutenant and is unafraid to lay down the law.

Bowa, 62, also has spent countless hours this spring working with the team on fundamentals. Most of that time has been devoted to baserunning principles, but Bowa clearly expects every facet of the game be played the right way at all times.

Against the Astros, that didn’t come close to happening.

In the past, it might have all been chalked up as a meaningless, spring-training game. In the world of Torre and Bowa, nothing is meaningless. And nothing like this is acceptable.